SpaceX moves toward manned flight

SpaceX has completed the first three performance milestones for the manned version of its Dragon/Falcon 9 spacecraft and launch system. In an announcement at its Hawthorne, California, headquarters, SpaceX said that the milestones are part of NASA's Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) initiative, which is intended to develop privately owned and operated manned spacecraft capable of taking passengers into low Earth orbit for NASA and private customers.

As SpaceX moves into what NASA calls the “third commercial crew phase” of the initiative, SpaceX provided the space agency with an integrated systems requirements review, which outlines the techniques the company will use to design, build and test the Dragon/Falcon 9 system. It also told NASA how it intends to handle manned flights from ground operations through to landing.